pitchfork is dumb (#34985859340293849494 in a series.)

why would a critic ever try to guess where a song comes from?

I'm more bothered by beck as impeccable influence

Wait, are you saying that doesn't seem accurate?

The description of "a sense of calculated disaffection", a combination of words that makes me imagine the shittiest band of all time, followed by "recommended" was repellant for me. I guess I like my disaffection to be natural, not carefully planned, so I would never recommend something like that.

Then again, I've never heard it so what do I know and so on.

b-but someone at pfork said "hm, how can we get people to read this review? I know! we'll mention the artist's impeccable influences and calculated disaffection! that'll reel 'em in!"

RIP satire etc

they could have collaged+mis-used _anything_ from the article, and they collaged+mis-used that

The White Williams album reminds me much more of late 10cc and Bread than of Roxy Music. That bit was like the classic "Let's over-hip our influences" review.

The description of "a sense of calculated disaffection", a combination of words that makes me imagine the shittiest band of all time, followed by "recommended" was repellant for me.

See, this sounds like the blurb WORKED for you -- i.e., efficiently let you know you would probably not like this act.

I agree, though, it looks kind of weird to have such a neutral-to-disparaging summary blurb on a recommended album.

I like how they gave the new Babyshambles, which is actually tuneful and a good all around album, a 4.0, but gave the first one, which is dreadful and hard to listen to / bloated, a 7.3,

Yeah, it was definitely TWICE as good as the new one. Fuckin' morons.

ugh, "impeccable influences" is really repulsive.

(xpost) was that a parody or are you really getting worked up about an internet score for babyshambles

He was worked up?

wait, i thought the grading scale was logarithmic. like 5 is twice as good as 4. somebody email ryan schreiber to find out.

shit, now i need to reevaluate all my purchases of the last five years.

It's actually modelled after the Richter Scale, hence the superlative designations of various well-reviewed albums as either "Reccomended," "Best New Music," or "Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On."

"White Williams issues a debut album layered with impeccable influences-- including Roxy Music, Beck, and T. Rex-- and a sense of calculated disaffection."

if anything, that reads like a good reason not to check out the album....

richter scale is logarithmic xpost

but kudos nonetheless

yeah sorry the "actually" sounded like I was disagreeing when it more of an "yeah and" thing

No band has marked indie's prog revival more definitively than Battles: Their debut, Mirrored, took rock for a set of puzzle pieces, but was ultimately defined by its pictorial sensibility-- each song felt like a cartoon soundtrack-- and the incorporation of jokes into the most historically humorless music in the known world.

wtf, wtf -- wtf? -- wtf!

the incorporation of JOKES

ya i saw that too... pretty lazy writing

How can you get paid to write if you don't know what "but" means?

jokes?!?!? has dude ever read the back of a don cab/a minor forest/whoever cd?

That bothers me more in a semantic sense: I think the album has a sense of humor, sure, but I don't know what "jokes" refers to in a largely instrumental piece of work.

joeks, bruv

You can here an interpolation of classic knock-knock jokes in "Atlas".

<i>jokes?!?!? has dude ever read the back of a don cab/a minor forest/whoever cd?

-- YGS, Friday, 2 November 2007 19:53 (10 minutes ago) Link</i>

"jokes" was horrible word choice on my part--john is right--but come on, do you really think that having a punny song title is the same as making music that is formally and sonically <i>humorous</i>? eh. don cab always struck me as definitively unfunny, they just tried to compensate with SURREAL HEADLINES.

Ha, I didn't even read the review, so I didn't know it was you, Mike.

There is a strong semantic difference between "humor" and "jokes"; they shouldn't be used interchangeably and, based on your followup here, you definitely meant the former.

Also, why did you use "but" as your conjunction? The second clause does not invert, negate, contradict or palpably change the meaning of the first clause (Mirrored being defined by pictoral sensibility and humor is not a condition that lies in opposition to it viewing rock as a set of puzzle pieces), so your sentence winds up not making any sense; you've either left out a critical piece of information or just flat-out used the wrong word.

There is a strong semantic difference between "humor" and "jokes"; they shouldn't be used interchangeably and, based on your followup here, you definitely meant the former.

Also, why did you use "but" as your conjunction? The second clause does not invert, negate, contradict or palpably change the meaning of the first clause (Mirrored being defined by pictoral sensibility and humor is not a condition that lies in opposition to it viewing rock as a set of puzzle pieces), so your sentence winds up not making any sense; you've either left out a critical piece of information or just flat-out used the wrong word.

-- HI DERE, Friday, November 2, 2007 8:19 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

you're right, 'but' wasn't a great choice. i think the idea was to say that though it had this puzzle-like quality--you could talk about how the parts fit together, like everyone does in a math-rock review--it was, for me, defined by these more abstract qualities: its sense of humor, its ability to be pictorally evocative. sure, i get what you're saying.

but seriously--human being here, willing to engage, bristles as asinine comments like the "knock-knock joke" one. furthermore--and i'd never slag scott or mark because i know they're incredibly busy guys--i think you bring the same charges to an editor. just saying.

sorry, you *could* bring the same charges. lord i grow weary of life's endless ironies.

I'm just glad you're writing regularly.

I think I'm pretty much firmly on record as someone who thinks there are a lot of editors out there who aren't doing what they should. This mostly stems from a desire to be an editor (ha).

Also I think the egregious misspelling of "hear" is more offensive than the actual knock-knock joke comment (which was an allusion to a recently-revived ILE thread).

Joke: pretending "Atlas" has a different lyric when he is very clearly singing

people like to
people like to
eat a sandwich

Also I think the egregious misspelling of "hear" is more offensive than the actual knock-knock joke comment (which was an allusion to a recently-revived ILE thread).

-- HI DERE, Friday, November 2, 2007 8:35 PM (44 seconds ago) Bookmark Link

and there i thought you were just aping my ignorance and carelessness.

(xpost - that's not actually funny, of course: people do like them some sandwiches)

i always heard the "eat a sandwich" bit as "penis terror"

though i think the sandwich lyric, in the context of the song's muscular schaffel, would basically make it a burger king commercial, which would be funny. sort of.

lolol xpost

I also first misheard the start of the chorus as "singing this hook, o-way-o," which made me imagine Battles as the Disney dwarves marching off to play songs -- hi-ho, hi-ho, singing this hook, playing this drum part, etc.

Yeah, so not spot-on, as he admits, but what Mike said in that review is clear enough, and cogent (whether you agree with him or not, he says why the band are worth considering, what's distinctive about them). Although I'm prejudiced, because I happen to agree with him:Battles are actually funny, and all about making giddy, hyperacticulate sounds that aren't just a blur or overload; in that sense, they have pop-rock appeal, like Don Cab at their best, and much more so than most of what gets called math-rock--they have a deliberately goofy-seeming grace, like the Harlem Globetrotters [which also goes with the visuals the music evokes-]and yeah, most prog isn't actually funny, def including most of the stuff that tried to be funny---although Soft Machine had their moments, til they canned Wyatt).

I also thought it was "sing this hook, o-way-o", which was much better.

people who think prog wasn't whimsical/jokey have never been forced to sit through a gentle giant cd

exception/rule.

Gong as well.

like I said, a lot of proggies *tried* to be funny (and some actually succeeded)(although whether it was as funny as the ones who didn't mean to be)

perhaps this is old news.....Atlas' lyrics, courtesy of Battles' myspace:
PEOPLE WONT BE PEOPLE WHEN THEY HEAR THIS SOUND
THAT'S BEEN GLOWING IN THE DARK AT THE EDGE OF TOWN
PEOPLE WONT BE PEOPLE, NO
THE PEOPLE WONT BE PEOPLE WHEN THEY HEAR THIS SOUND
WONT YOU SHOW ME WHAT BEGINS AT THE EDGE OF TOWN

THE SINGER IS A CROOK
THE SINGER IS A CROOK
THE SINGER IS A CROOK
THE SINGER IS A CROOK
THE KITCHEN IS THE COOK
THE SCISSORS ARE THE BARBERS
THE SINGER IS A CROOK
THE CHORUS, FULL OF ACTORS

*THE CHORUS DOESN'T MATTER (LAST VERSE)

okay.....thisreview

an iTunes-only collection of songs meant for charity? why is this even worth reviewing? (much less as the headlining review of the day?)

granted, i've got basically zero interest in this collection or Natalie Portman's charitable acts, but still, i guess i'm not sure whether a thrown-together comp meant to raise money for a charity really calls for substantive musical criticism. there isn't anything more musically interesting that was released this week?

It's a compilation with exclusive tracks from the Shins, Devendra Banhart, Beirut, M. Ward, and Rogue Wave and tracks by Antony, Vetiver, Thee More Shallows. That's relevant to our audience.

What else came out this week? Jay-Z, a Sigur Ros comp, a Grizzly Bear EP, Burial, a Tokyo Police Club EP, Citay, a Wire EP. A lot of records with little lead time between promos and release (burial, sigur ros), no promos (wire, jay-z), and some indie rock EPs.

That said, this isn't an ideal headliner to open a week. But expect a lot of compilations, reissues, and major-label releases as headliners for the next six weeks-- that's basically all that's being released.

thanks, scott. sorry for the tone - i didn't mean to come off as pissy i did

Apparently the rights revert back to Alan in a year or two, so hopefully a reissue coming.

oh are they? that's great news. he's talked about wanting to do reissues for ages but universal previously refused offers to buy back the rights

it's still on streaming here in australia

and in the UK, on Tidal at least.

but if you search for the album on YouTube Music, that's what comes up (as a "video").

this feels alarming tbh

if ever there was a site where if you're going to paywall people into music, going old-school and citing/linking sources for the article would be great.

where did this intro "corona" story come from?! jackass links are probably easier to cite.

does anyone know much the switch to subscriptions hurt readership of reviews?

i checked in on a daily basis for many years, just to see what was being reviewed if nothing else, get a general feel. but i haven’t dropped by since the switcheroo. i know you get a few free reads per month, but it introduces this weird “but what if i need to save this read for something big later in the month” scarcity mindset that is exactly the same as finishing a final fantasy with hundreds of unused powerful potions, just to make sure you had enough for later. and i know how archive.ph work but it’s just too much hassle.

i spend my free read tokens when friends of the pod are reviewing

i guess they probably get most of their views/ads revenue through the “news”? and then there’s this other, much smaller audience of heavy review readers who are willing to fork over money in order to continue reading all of them, give modest mouse a 9.4 whatever

I'm in the same boat as you. I checked every day out of a habit and I haven't bothered since the change.

I do check it still pretty often, but I read next to nothing. I read the Seefeel review a few days ago, first one I've read in months. It was a good review. If I trusted the people running the site with not making it worse in a few months, I'd probably consider paying.

give modest mouse a 9.4 whatever

― z_tbd, Monday, May 11, 2026 6:57 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

that's an incredibly unlikely scenario tbh

A P4k subscriber giving Modest Mouse a 9.4 is unlikely?

heh, yeah that’s what i was referring to, very vaguely - the addition of reader review scores. i assume there are a lot of 9.4s

ah sorry misread

I subscribed, because why not, and I leaf through the reviews once a week, reading pieces about artists I like, or by writers I like, or anything that's getting a BNM. Just yesterday I did a hate-read by a writer I really don't like and was pleasantly surprised at how cogent and thoughtful the analysis was, which was nice to read, always good to feel like somebody you've written off is upping their game